Black River Falls by Jeff Hirsch(33)

“Maybe that’s why you left.”

Hannah laughed. She pulled off her boots and let her feet dangle in the wavelets at the reservoir’s edge. “Can I ask you a weird question? It’s something I’ve been wondering.”

“Sure.”

“Is Cardinal your real name? I mean, that’s a kind of bird, right? Your parents named you after a bird?”

“No. My dad—he, uh, he wrote comic books. Cardinal was a character of his.”

“Seriously? That’s so cool! What are the comics about?”

“This group of superheroes in a place called Liberty City,” I said. “The Brotherhood of Wings. There’s Black Eagle. Sally Sparrow. Blue Jay. Kestrel Kain. Rex Raven. Goldfinch. Lord Starling.”

“And Cardinal,” Hannah said.

The first few pages of issue one came flooding into my head. Mild-mannered Cameron Conner sweeping up the lab while he pines for Sally Sparrow, his true love, who barely knows he exists.

“He was a nobody at first,” I said. “Just a technician and a part-time inventor who worked in the lab. And then one day the Brotherhood was defeated by a bad guy named Kirzon Sloat, and Conner threw on this experimental suit of armor he’d built from scratch and saved the day.”

I flipped through the pages in my head until I came to one of my all-time favorite sequences—Cardinal being unmasked by Rex Raven. Sally Sparrow gasps in shock when she sees that their savior is some anonymous lab tech. Conner is heartbroken, convinced that she’s going to make him give up the Cardinal armor and return to his lab, but in the very last panel Sally leaps into his arms and kisses him.

Holy heartthrob! Blue Jay exclaims. Looks like there’s only one bird for Sally Sparrow now!

“That sounds amazing!” Hannah said. “Tell me more.”

“About the comics?”

Hannah crossed her legs and leaned over them. “No. About you.”

“About me? Why?”

“I’ve decided I like knowing things about people. And since you’re the only person up here who actually knows anything about himself, I’ve got nowhere else to turn.”

It was hard logic to argue against. “What do you want to know?”

“Umm. Let’s see. You said you have a brother. What’s his name?”

A picture flashed into my head—you standing on the sidewalk, hands jammed into your jacket pockets. I scooped up a handful of rocks and skipped one across the water.

“Tennant. His name’s Tennant.”

“Is that a strange name too?”

I couldn’t help but laugh a little. “Kind of. Yeah. My mom was really into Dr. Who. It’s this science-fiction TV show? Anyway, the tenth doctor was her favorite, so they named my brother after the actor who played him. If he’d been a girl, Mom was going to name him Vastra, so I guess he kinda lucked out.”

“What’s your mom do?”

I saw Mom onstage, mid-pirouette. My nose filled with the scent of roses.

“Card?”

“She, uh, she was a dancer. But she hurt her ankle a few years back and had to stop. She was going to start teaching when we moved here from the city, but it never really worked out.”

“Wow. You have such a cool family. Are they all—” Hannah cut herself off. “Sorry. I was going ask if they were all . . . it’s none of my business. I shouldn’t have—”

“Tennant was away at college when Lassiter’s hit.”

There was a rustle as Hannah shifted position. Water lapped against the shore.

“Oh. Well, that’s good,” she said. “Lucky.”

I nodded and pushed the rocks around in my hand. They made a click like bones knocking together. There was a splash out on the reservoir. I looked up and saw another white V streaming across the surface toward us.

Hannah stood up on her rock. “How was it?” she called.

“Cold!”

Greer pulled himself to the shallows and strode toward us, naked and shivering.

“You know, I take it back. I wasn’t a professional swimmer. But I’m pretty sure I might have been a nudist. Seriously, this is the way to go. Hannah, give it a try.”

She laughed, untied the hoodie from around her waist, and threw it at him.

“Dry yourself off. You’re indecent.”

Not long after that, we were on our way back to camp, barefoot, our shoes hanging over our shoulders by the laces, as if we’d just come from a long day at the beach. I felt unbelievably light, like each step I took was covering miles. The talk flowed effortlessly, rising and falling, punctuated by laughter. At some point Snow Cone and Hershey Bar came running out of the woods and trotted alongside us. It was one of those times when you felt like there was some sort of current running through the world and you had stepped into it and been carried away.

Firelight from the camp appeared as a glow in the trees ahead, along with the faint sounds of the kids’ voices. Hershey Bar and Snow Cone ran off down the trail. No one said anything, but I felt the three of us slow down until we were just barely drifting along, trying to delay the inevitable. Still, the end came. We hit the junction where the trail branched off to Hannah’s and my campsites. Greer pressed on ahead, raising his hand in farewell.

“Maybe Carrie’s still up!” Hannah called out. “You should go say hi.”